Chapter 11 - Ten MinutesGabriel led Clara through a private elevator.
They descended beneath the hotel.
One level.
Two.
Three.
The doors opened to a hospital corridor.
Clara's breathing became shallow.
“Where is she?”
Gabriel pointed to Room 13.
Clara ran.
Eleanor lay on a bed surrounded by monitors.
Alive.
Barely.
“Mom!”
Eleanor opened her eyes.
“Clara.”
They held hands.
Tears fell freely.
“I thought you were dead.”
“I wanted you to believe I was.”
“Why?”
“To keep him from finding you.”
Clara glanced toward Gabriel.
He stood by the door.
Eleanor whispered:
“You have to leave.”
“No.”
“He wants the code.”
“I don't have it.”
Eleanor smiled faintly.
“Yes, you do.”
Clara touched her forehead.
“I don't remember.”
“Look at me.”
Clara did.
“Your memory wasn't erased completely.”
“What?”
“We hid it.”
“Where?”
Eleanor touched Clara's chest.
“Inside the things you loved.”
Clara frowned.
“Your piano.”
Her childhood piano.
The one her father had kept locked for years.
Eleanor nodded.
“The melody.”
“What melody?”
“The one I taught you.”
Clara closed her eyes.
A melody surfaced.
Four notes.
Then four more.
A sequence.
Numbers.
She whispered:
“Seven. Three. Nine. One.”
Eleanor nodded.
“That is only the beginning.”
Gabriel suddenly stepped forward.
“Enough.”
Eleanor looked at him.
“You've already lost.”
Gabriel smiled.
“Not yet.”
The lights flickered.
A nurse entered.
Then another.
Both carried weapons.
Alexander suddenly crashed through the emergency exit.
Gunfire erupted.
Gabriel escaped.
Alexander ran to Clara.
“Are you okay?”
She pointed toward the corridor.
“Get my mother out.”
“We need to go.”
“No.”
Eleanor grabbed Clara.
“Listen.”
She whispered the final numbers.
Clara memorized them.
Then Eleanor smiled.
“Now forget me again.”
“What?”
“Trust no one.”
Her heart monitor changed tone.
Clara screamed.
“Mom!”
Alexander pulled her away as doctors rushed in.
Gabriel appeared at the end of the corridor.
Clara saw him.
Then she realized something.
The sequence Eleanor had given her wasn't numbers.
It was coordinates.
Coordinates to something.
Something hidden beneath the city.
Alexander saw her expression.
“What?”
Clara whispered:
“I know where Orchid is.”
“Where?”
She looked at the hospital floor.
“Under the original Vale estate.”
Alexander froze.
“That house burned down fifteen years ago.”
Clara shook her head.
“No.”
She looked toward Gabriel.
“He wants us to think it burned.”
Gabriel smiled.
Then he said something terrifying.
“You're finally remembering.”
He raised his weapon.
Alexander shoved Clara aside.
The gunshot hit him.
He collapsed.
Clara screamed.
Gabriel walked toward her.
May you like
“Now,” he said softly,
“you belong to me.”
